


Dark Paradise

by andiepandie



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Inspired by the Lana Del Rey song of the same name, M/M, Major self loathing thoughts, Not Happy, Suicide, THERE ARE NO HAPPY ENDINGS HERE, at all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-10
Updated: 2017-03-10
Packaged: 2018-10-02 07:00:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10212095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andiepandie/pseuds/andiepandie
Summary: And there's no remedy for memory your faceLike a melody, it won't lift my headYour soul is haunting me and telling meThat everything is fineBut I wish I was deadEnjolras is dead. Grantaire... isn't doing well.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [黑暗天堂/Dark Paradise](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10510188) by [kimerufuji](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimerufuji/pseuds/kimerufuji)



> Again, I'd just like to say that there is a suicide in this. And that it isn't happy. At all.
> 
>  
> 
> Big thank you to the wonderful Alex for letting me tear his heart out while he proofread this!!! <3

Water gently lapped around Grantaire’s feet as he stared, unseeing, into the crashing waves. A flash of gold out the corner of his eye caught his attention, his head snapping to the side, only to droop dejectedly when he realised it was yet again a figment of his tormented imagination.  
  
“’Aire. ’Aire!” Bahorel jostled his arm. Grantaire tried to blink, only to flinch when the darkness behind his eyes assaulted him with flashes of _gold-red-white-no-stop!  
_    
“Grantaire!” as Grantaire curled into a ball and toppled over, Bahorel could swear that he heard a faint mumbling. Leaning closer, he realised that Grantaire was singing.  
   
 _“Red, I feel my soul on fire. Black, my world if he’s not there. Red, the colour of desire. Black, the colour of despair!”  
_    
The blood drained from Bahorel’s face as he straightened up, eyes connecting with Jehan’s.  
   
A hand touched R’s cheek. Whimpering, he pressed his face closer to the coarse sand, screwing his eyes shut tight.  
   
“Grantaire,” a voice murmured close to his ear. A cool hand smoothed the hair away from his forehead.  
   
“You’re not real,” R bawled, curling his knees closer to his body.  
   
“I’m as real as you want me to be, my love.” Enjolras said, as golden and glorious as he had been in life.  
   
“’Aire? Who are you talking to?” Jehan asked, smoothing over his shoulder.  
   
Jehan’s voice seemed to break the spell Grantaire was under, as Enjolras dissolved into the mist curling off the roiling waves.  
   
“Come back!” Grantaire cried, lurching out of his friend’s grasp, clutching fruitlessly at the air.  
   
His hands sank into the sand, his back curving and his head hanging low under the weight of his anguish.  
   
Jehan and Bahorel exchanged a look, before reaching for their friend. They enveloped him in their arms as he shook and wept, begging for his lost love to return to him.  
   
Bahorel tightened his grip around Grantaire. “Why do you do this to yourself, man?”  
   
Grantaire sobbed brokenly before abruptly going quiet.  
   
“He’s asleep, finally.” Jehan murmured. Bahorel nodded, scooping him up into his arms to carry him carefully back to the seaside haunt they’d found him in.  
   
“He’s being selfish!” the outburst abruptly pulled Jehan and Bahorel out of their concern.  
   
“Courf–” Combeferre’s voice conveyed every ounce of the exhaustion he held on his already overloaded shoulders.  
   
“Don’t you fucking Courf me! He’s not the only one grieving, you know!”  
   
“I do know! Do you know _you’re_ not the only one grieving either?”  
   
“That’s not what I’m saying! The others aren’t able to process, they’re too busy fucking fawning over him!” Courfeyrac threw his arms out.  
   
“Enjolras died _in front of him_. On their _first date_. You can’t blame him for being traumatised!”  
   
“Well maybe if they hadn’t been on the date Enjolras wouldn’t have died!”  
   
“That line of thinking is dangerous and you know it,” Combeferre said, spotting the trio. “Go take a walk or something, you’re not thinking properly.”  
   
“God for-fucking-bid I try to hold someone accountable!” Courfeyrac spat.  
   
“Now you’re just not being fair. There wasn’t anything Grantaire could have done to prevent _or_ cause this.” Bahorel glared, tightening his arms protectively around Grantaire’s limp form.  
   
“I’m sure,” Courfeyrac scoffed, shoving past them.  
   
Combeferre sighed at his retreating form, scrubbing his hand over his face.  
   
“You could do with some rest ‘Ferre,” Jehan murmured.  
   
“We all could,” Bahorel nodded, as Jehan curled a hand around Combeferre’s elbow, leading him towards one of the bedrooms.

 

\--

 

The shuffle of Bahorel’s feet and the click of the bedroom door shutting brought Grantaire back into himself, him that he was alone at last.  
   
Well.  
   
As alone as he could be, nowadays.  
   
The whisper of blankets shifting alerted him to the presence that had yet again rejoined him.  
   
Cool lips pressed against his cheek. “Grantaire,” Enjolras breathed.  
   
“What do you want?” Grantaire asked, torn between covering his ears and being unwilling to part from his siren’s song.  
   
“He’s right you know, Grantaire. It is your fault. If you hadn’t said anything, I would still be alive. I’d be sitting in the next room, chatting with my friends. If you hadn’t said anything, you’d still be in here, drunk off your arse yet again. Taking up space. Because that’s all you are, aren’t you Grantaire? A waste of space.”  
   
Grantaire didn’t bother to protest. He knew it was true.  
   
“A waste of space that nobody wants to be around. They’d be happier if you weren’t here, you know. They’d be able to grieve me in peace, not having to worry about what a burden like you might have gotten yourself into. The only form of babysitting they’d need to concern themselves with would be for Gavroche and Azelma, not for a supposedly grown man who can’t even keep himself under enough control to not get off his face five nights a week. You’re pathetic.”  
   
Grantaire opened his eyes. Enjolras loomed over him, every inch the righteous angel he had been in Grantaire’s paintings. His gaze bore into Grantaire’s forehead.  
   
“ _You know what should be done_.”

 

\---

 

Grantaire came back to himself on the shoreline again. The waves kissed his feet as the moonlight danced off the depths of the ocean floor, his shoes abandoned next to him. A hand brushed the hair away from the nape of his neck, before sliding around to cup his cheek as Enjolras reappeared in front of him.  
  
“Come, my love,” Enjolras cajoled, smiling warmly at him. “Join me, and we can be together always.”  
   
Grantaire caught Enjolras’ hand in his own, biting his lip.  
   
“It won’t hurt, if that’s what worries you. It’ll be as quick and easy as falling asleep.”  
   
A single tear fell down his cheek.  
   
“Come on, my darling. I permit you to follow me.”  
   
Grantaire took one step forward. Then another. As he submerged himself deeper within the waves, he found himself singing again.  
   
“ _Love of mine, one day you will die, but I’ll be close behind. I’ll follow you into the dark_.”

 

\---

 

Carefully balancing the tray of breakfast on one hand, Bahorel rapped on Grantaire’s door. “‘Aire?” he said.  
   
No response.  
   
Frowning, Bahorel nudged it open. Empty. He deposited the tray on a desk, before knocking on Jehan’s door.  
   
“Hey, Jehan?” he called.  
   
Jehan stuck his head out his bedroom. “Yeah?”  
   
“Is Grantaire with you?”  
   
Jehan straightened up. “No. Why?”  
   
“He’s not in his room. Could you check with ‘Ferre if he’s with him while I shoot Courf a text?”  
   
Jehan nodded, hurrying across the hall. Bahorel pulled out his phone, biting his lip.  
   
 _Hey, have you heard from Grantaire?_ He sent.  
   
 _No, not since I left last night._ Courf responded. _Sorry about that, by the way_.  
   
 _You’re under a lot of stress, it’s fine. Could you have a look around, see if he’s wandered off somewhere? He’s been getting really out of it recently_.  
   
 _Sure,_ Courf texted. _I’ll have a check down by the beach, see if he’s there_.  
   
 _Thanks_ , Bahorel sent, before locking his phone.  
   
“Has Courf seen him?” Combeferre asked. Bahorel glanced up, biting his nail.  
  
“Not yet, but he’s going to check down at the beach. I’m guessing because you’re asking, he’s not with you?”  
   
Combeferre shook his head, brows furrowed.  
   
“We should all check the beach. It’s where he’d most likely be, and we’ll be able to cover more ground that way.”  
   
Upon their arrival at the beach, they quickly bumped into Courfeyrac, who confirmed no sighting of him thus far.  
   
It was Jehan who spotted them first.  
   
There, right where the tide stopped, were Grantaire’s shoes.  
   
“I – is that it?” Courfeyrac asked.  
   
“They’re the only things of his that we’ve found that were taken from his room,” Bahorel said, frowning down at them.  
   
“So… what do we do now?” Jehan asked, his gaze flickering between their faces.  
   
“I – I don’t know.” Combeferre sighed. In the pale morning light he seemed to have aged thirty years, his light brown hair turning silvery and his shoulders slumping, the weight of the world placed on them in twice as many weeks. “Is there anything we can do?”

In a choked whisper, Courfeyrac said, “I don’t want to bury a pair of shoes.”


End file.
